sign in sign up
<<
Home , Akihito, Emperor Meiji, Enryaku, Enthronement, Hirohito, Iwakura Tomomi

Volume 18 | Issue 12 | Number 1 | Article ID 5404 | Jun 05, 2020 The -Pacific Journal | Focus

The Quality of Emperorship in Japan: Reflections on the Accession

John Breen

the people and being with the people. The ’s TV address sent shock waves across 1 Introduction Japan, and prompted a rush of commentary about emperorship, about , and, On 8 August 2016, Emperor 明仁天皇 indeed, about the precarious future of the (r. 1989-2019) appeared on national TV to imperial line. The ruling LDP spoke up, as did address the for only the all the major political parties. There were 2 second time in his twenty seven year . His vociferous interventions, too, from the ultra- first appearance was five years before in March conservative Nippon Kaigi日本会議 2011 in response to the devastation of the organization, of which Prime Minister Abe 3 Great East Japan Earthquake. In 2016, it was Shinzō 安倍晋三 is a member.4 The several the very different matter of abdication that experts, whom the prime minister subsequently animated him. In a performance that was all consulted, let their views be known.5 Others, the more riveting for being understated, he not directly consulted, spoke up from across informed the nation - in suitably oblique fashion the political spectrum. Some academics - but - of his desire to abdicate. The problem he surprisingly few – also pitched in. confronted was the law. The Imperial Household Law (Kōshitsu tenpan 皇室典範) has This author was struck by the fact that no provision for abdication; rather in Chapter 3 commentators gave no critical attention to the it provides for a regency in the event an emperor’s rites of accession. After all, a careful emperor can no longer continue. Emperor study of the dynamic, ritual process of Akihito was challenging the law, and seeking emperor-making in its historical context should popular support for his challenge. This was a reveal much about Japanese emperorship: what political move of the sort not permitted him it is, what it has been and what it aspires to be. under the . So, it is little wonder The oversight is perhaps explained by our that Emperor Akihito caused a stir. tendency to assume princes, kings and play only the most passive role in But the emperor here was doing something ritual events. We speak unguardedly of more than challenge the Imperial Household accession rites as if they work on a prince and Law. He was setting forth his understanding of make of him a king or an emperor; or that a the quality of twenty first century emperorship, prince undergoes such rites in order to become as set out in the , Chapter king or emperor. There is of course validity to 1, Article 1. This is the Article that identifies this view, but only some. If we look back at the the emperor as “symbol of the State and the Reiwa 令和 accession rites, which extended unity of the people.” Since the Constitution from April 2019 through till December, we can does not define the meaning of “emperor as see that the role of , prince and symbol,” the emperor had had to come to his emperor, was a dynamic one. own conclusions. As he articulated it in August 2016, it meant nothing so much as praying for What Naruhito did here was construct, display

1 18 | 12 | 1 APJ | JF and render meaningful an array of new and and personal. In the final section, I return to privileged relationships of power. The dynamic the twenty first century to look again at building of power relations is a universal Emperor Akihito’s personal and very public function of ritual performances; Japanese intervention of August 2016. I ask what it, and accessions can be no exception. Three of these the reactions to it, reveal about the quality of clearly mattered above all in 2019: emperorship in the 21st century.

i. The first saw the emperor engage with the Sun Goddess, Ōmikami 天 1) Ancestors, Politics and People 照大神, with the spirits of the imperial ancestors (kōrei 皇霊), and with other We can reflect on the Reiwa accession rites as assorted 神; a drama in five more or less distinct acts. It was ii. The second had the emperor engage with a drama because, before our eyes, a crown the Japanese state, as represented by the prince transformed himself into an emperor. As heads of the three powers (sanken no chō for the five acts, Act 1 was Emperor Akihito’s 三権の長): the prime minister, the chief rite of abdication staged in the Matsu no Ma 松 justice of the supreme court, and the の間State Hall of the Imperial Palace on 30 speakers of the House of Representatives April (Figure 1).6 and the House of Councilors; iii. In the third relationship, the emperor engaged with the Japanese people, “with whom resides power.”

In his August 2016 TV address, Emperor Akihito had stressed the importance of his relationship to the Japanese people, but the quality of Japanese emperorship is to be found in this multiplicity of power relations.

In this essay, I first focus on the dynamic role scripted for the emperor in the Reiwa accession drama, the better to bring these critical power relations into relief. I then take an historical perspective, and trace the roots of this Figure 1: Act 1 Emperor Akihito Abdicates emperorship back to the imperial of 150 years ago, to the new accession rites invented by bureaucrats and refined in 徳 the Taisho period. It is in this Meiji-Taisho Act 2, on 1 May, saw Naruhito transition that the origins of the Reiwa仁 receive the and the jewel of the accession are to be found. Accession rites are imperial in the same ritual space, and of key importance in understandingthen re-appear as Emperor Naruhito for the emperorship, but in the end, they are not first time (Figure 2).7 everything. They shape, and are themselves shaped by, other interventions: legal, political

2 18 | 12 | 1 APJ | JF

Figure 2: Act 2 Rite of Regalia Transfer

Act 3 took place six months later on 22 October Figure 4: Act 4 The Daijōsai in the same Matsu no Ma State Hall, when emperor and empress physically ascended their , presenting themselves for the first The fifth and final act was a cluster of ritual time to the national and international events that ran from the end of November community (Figure 3).8 through into December. The emperor left the imperial palace with the empress, and embarked on an extended pilgrimage of imperial ancestral sites: the Ise Shrines 伊勢神 宮 in Mie Prefecture; and the mausoleums of Emperor Jinmu 神武天皇 in , and of and his father in , and of Emperors Taisho and Showa in (Figure 5).

Figure 3: Act 3 Emperor Naruhito’s

Act 4 was the two-scenedaijōsai 大嘗祭 or great rite of tasting on the night of 14-15 November, when Emperor Naruhito feasted twice with the Sun Goddess on the first fruits of Figure 5: Act 5 Emperor Naruhito at Ise’s the harvest (Figure 4). Inner Shrine

3 18 | 12 | 1 APJ | JF

Such anyway was the five-act sequence through which Crown Prince Naruhito transformed himself into Emperor Naruhito. What merits attention are the new, privileged relationships of power that he was constructing here. The first of them connected the emperor with the sacred realm: with the Sun Goddess, the spirits of the imperial ancestors, and the myriad kami of heaven and earth. In the November daijōsai, he came face to face with the Sun Goddess in the Daijō Palace (Daijōkyū 大嘗宮), a cluster of wooden buildings specially erected in the grounds of the Tokyo palace proper. On this Figure 6: Imperial Palace Shrine-complex: occasion, he entered in turn the palace’s two Kyūchū Sanden main halls, the Yukiden 悠紀殿 and the Sukiden 主基殿. In each, he faced Ise where the Sun Goddess is enshrined, and presented to her offerings of rice, millet, and rice wine, red- The new emperor and empress visited the site snapper, horse mackerel, and abalone,on 1 May, 8 May, 22 October and again on 4 chestnuts, and dried persimmons.9 In the December after completing their pilgrimage of company of the Sun Goddess, he then partook ancestral sites. Figure 7 shows Emperor of rice, millet, and rice wine. A fortnight later, Naruhito in the Kashikodokoro on 8 May, relaying to the Sun Goddess his receipt of the he headed to the Ise Shrines with the empress regalia. The emperor moreover dispatched gift- to venerate the Sun Goddess again, before bearing emissaries to the Ise Shrines, to the touring the ancestral mausoleums in Nara, imperial mausoleums and to a selection of Kyoto and Tokyo. But this was by no means the major shrines, to report on the emperor-making extent of it. drama. The emperor marked every stage of the accession sequence with veneration of the Sun Goddess and the imperial ancestors. These acts of veneration took place in a ritual complex within the grounds of the imperial palace, known as the Kyūchū Sanden 宮中三殿 (Figure 6). It is a three-part, segmented sacred space, the center of which is occupied by the Kashikodokoro 賢所, the Sun Goddess’s shrine. It contains a mirror that is a replica of the one in Ise. It is flanked on the far side by a shrine for the imperial ancestors, the Kōreiden 皇霊殿. The spirits of all Japanese emperors, historical and mythical, extending back from the new emperor’s grandfather to Jinmu are venerated here. The shrine that flanks it on the near side is dedicated to the myriad gods of heaven and Figure 7: Emperor Naruhito Reports to the earth, and is known as the Shinden 神殿. Sun Goddess his Receipt of the Regalia

4 18 | 12 | 1 APJ | JF

to the prime minister loomed particularly large during the accession rites. Prime Minister Abe The emperor’s ritual cultivation of the Sun Shinzō addressed Emperor Akihito in the Goddess, the ancestors and the kami isabdication rite, expressing profound gratitude obviously of paramount importance in the for his reign. He participated in the rite of twenty first century. Through his ritual actions, regalia transfer, and later responded to the the emperor articulates the that he is a new emperor’s inaugural address with filial descendent of the Sun Goddess – why else felicitations and prayers for a long and venerate her? - that the imperial line is prosperous reign. The prime minister was at unbroken for all ages – hence the emphasis on the 22 October enthronement, too. Not only did the ancestral kami - and that the line is he address the emperor with felicitations on therefore sacred. There is an obvious tension this occasion, but, in a moment of drama, led here between the constitutional emperor, who the assembled in three celebratory shouts of derives his position from the will of the people banzai (Figure 8). (Constitution of Japan, Article 1), and the “Sun- Goddess-worshipping emperor.” In pre-war Japan, at least, the emperor worshipped the Sun Goddess in the daijōsai precisely because she authorized his right to rule. Prewar, of course, the myth and its ritual articulation had a public, state-determined quality. Postwar, the myth and the rites are the private concerns of the imperial family.

If the daijōsai is, after all, private why were the heads of the three branches of in attendance? Why did the government fund the daijōsai with a budget set aside for the emperor’s public events?10 Why, indeed, did the government encourage people across Japan to submit offerings of local produce to the Sun Goddess at the daijōsai? I return to this last matter below. The point is that there remains an unmistakably public quality to the twenty- first century daijōsai and to the emperor’s worship of his ancestors.

The emperor used the accession stage to construct two other significant relationships, which are entirely secular. The first bound him Figure 8: Prime Minister Abe Shinzō’s to the Japanese state, in the person of prime Banzai minister, the chief justice of the supreme court, and the heads of the upper and lower houses of the diet. Under the postwar constitution, the emperor has no political power of course, but (This was the cue for a unit of the Self Defense as “symbol of the state” he is an integral part of Forces stationed in Kita no Maru Park 北の丸公 the Japanese polity. The emperor’s relationship 園, adjacent to the palace, to fire off a 21-gun

5 18 | 12 | 1 APJ | JF salute.) The Prime Minister was also a more controversial presence at the “religious” daijōsai in November. The controversy is on account of Article 20 of the Constitution, which requires the separation of state and religion.

What then of the third key relationship which Emperor Naruhito constructed on the stage of his accession rites, his relationship with the Japanese people? As the Constitution states, it is from the Japanese people that he “derives his position”; it is of their unity that he is a symbol. Figure 9: Emperor, Empress and Imperial On 1 May, a national holiday, Emperor Family on the Chōwaden balcony Naruhito delivered an inaugural address in which he spoke in this way about the people:

I swear that I will act according to the Again, the emperor spoke of his concern for the Constitution and fulfill my responsibility as people. On this day, the government informed the symbol of the State and of the unity of 550,000 convicted criminals that their slates the people of Japan, while always turning were wiped clean.12 The emperor’s celebratory my thoughts to the people and standing parade, delayed because of typhoon damage, with them. I sincerely pray for thefinally took place on 10 November. With the happiness of the people and the further empress, he rode in an open-top car west development of the nation as well as the across Tokyo from the palace to Akasaka 赤坂. peace of the world.11 The parade exposed the couple - and the prime minister who also took part - to the view of It is noteworthy that he speaks here not hundreds of thousands of well-wishers. Millions directly to the people in the second person, but more watched on TV and the internet (Figure about the people in the third person. What he 10). said was, anyway, directed at the people for their benefit through electronic and digital media.

On 4 May, he and the empress appeared on the balcony of the Chōwaden長和殿 palace building to greet crowds of well-wishers (Figure 9). This was broadcast live to the nation on TV and the internet, as was the enthronement of 22 October, another national holiday.

Figure 10: The Celebratory Parade from the Palace to Akasaka

6 18 | 12 | 1 APJ | JF

At the November daijōsai, too, the emperor connected with the Japanese people. Farmers and fishermen from across Japan were invited to submit local produce as offerings to him and to the Sun Goddess. Figure 11 maps the produce submitted from different regions of Japan. Farmers in the more rural parts of Tokyo, for example, sent rice, cabbage, radishes, udo salad plants, and mushrooms. Kyoto farmers offered rice, potatoes, tea, and millet. All of this freshly harvested produce was set before the two pavilions of the Daijō Palace on the night of 14 November.13

Figure 12: The Daijō Palace, 25 November 201915

Such then are the key privileged relationships Figure 11: Regional Offerings Placed which the emperor constructed at his accession: with the Sun Goddess and imperial before the Yuki and Suki Halls of the Daijō ancestors, with the Japanese state, and with the Palace14 Japanese people. It is in these relationships that the essence of twentieth first century

Japanese emperorship appears to inhere. The function of ritual everywhere is not only to Select scenes from the daijōsai were broadcast articulate relations of power, but to root them to the nation on the media, and once the feast in remotest antiquity beyond dispute. The was over, the Daijō Palace was opened for Reiwa accession rites were typical in this public viewing before it was dismantled (Figure regard: they sought to persuade us that 12). In brief, the emperor engaged with the Japanese emperors had since ancient times Japanese people in every act, if not quite every been defined by their relationship to the Sun scene, of the accession drama. Goddess, to the state and to the people. In this endeavor, they were it seems successful.16 In fact, however, it is only in recent history that

7 18 | 12 | 1 APJ | JF these relationships came to inform Japanese October 1868), and Act 3 Daijōsai (Tokyo; 28 accession rites, and so shape JapaneseDecember 1871). emperorship. They first emerged at the in the mid nineteenth century. Most striking about this enthronement scene in Figure 13 are the ritual participants. On the eastern side of the garden (right of the picture) close to the hall steps sits the new 2) The Modern Experience government’s president, 岩倉 具視 (1825-1883). Beside him, are the ministers i. The Meiji Revolution of foreign affairs, of the navy and army, of finance and domestic affairs. Senior and junior Figure 13 depicts the Shishinden紫宸殿 councilors and provincial governors sit directly Enthronement Hall and garden, located in the opposite them on the western side (center southern sector of the imperial palace complex picture). Kyoto-resident daimyo and warrior in Kyoto. cohorts sit further south on the east side. This therefore is a thoroughly politicized space. Just

visible at the foot of the Shishinden steps is a large globe. It rained on the day of the enthronement so the emperor never got to tap the globe with his foot. But the intent was clear: the modern Japanese emperor was not to be confined within the walls of the Kyoto palace; he was a new sovereign for a new Japan in an age of international politics. The contrast with premodern , entirely private affairs of the Kyoto court, attended only by imperial princes, courtiers and ritualists, could not be sharper. But politicization was not the only innovation. Figure 13: Emperor Meiji’s Enthronement17 There is a powerful new, sacred dimension to the proceedings here. Pre-Meiji enthronements were of course sacred events, too, but their The date is 12 October 1868, and the event is quality was very different. Twenty years the enthronement of 15-year old Mutsuhito 睦 earlier, on 31 October 1847, the Meiji 仁. Crown Prince Mutsuhito had received the emperor’s father, Kōmei, had proceeded to the sword and jewel of the regalia on the death of Shinshinden Hall, clad in Chinese court attire his father, Emperor Kōmei孝明天皇 of vermilion, wearing on his head an elaborate (r.1846-1867) just before the Restoration, some crown bedecked with jewels, reciting eighteen months earlier. This enthronement sacred Buddhist words as he formed his hands took place nine months after the Restoration. into Shingon mudra. As he ascended the The daijōsai, by the way, would be staged fully , he merged his human body with the three years later in the new capital of Tokyo. body of the Great Sun Buddha. The Shishinden These, anyway, were the three distinct acts in garden on this momentous day was filled with the accession drama of Japan’s first modern the fragrance of incense, which carried to emperor: Act 1 Regalia transfer (Kyoto; 13 heaven tidings of his enthronement; its space February 1867); Act 2 Enthronement (Kyoto; 12 was arranged according to yin yang principles,

8 18 | 12 | 1 APJ | JF and populated by courtiers similarly clad in state and with the people. The man responsible Chinese attire. for it all was Fukuba Bisei福羽美静 (1831-1907) (Figure 14). The substance of the sacred at the Meiji enthronement was of a different order. Adjacent to the Shishinden on its east side, but structurally removed from it, is a small shrine called the Naishidokoro 内侍所, dedicated to the Sun Goddess. The shrine is as old as the palace itself but, to the best knowledge of this author, no early modern emperor ever worshipped there. The shrine anyway had no place in pre-Meiji enthronements. Yet, on the morning of 12 October 1868, the Meiji emperor proceeded first to this Naishidokoro shrine, to make offerings to the Sun Goddess. And at the very same time, imperial emissaries were at the Ise Shrines, at the mausoleum of Emperor Jinmu in Nara, and at a selection of imperial ancestral sites across the city of Kyoto making offerings on his behalf. This flurry of ancestor- oriented ritual activity was entirely without precedent.18

The Meiji enthronement was not only politicized, and rendered newly sacred. It was “popularized” too, albeit to an extent limited by the civil war. The Restoration government declared the enthronement day a national Figure 14: Fukuba Bisei holiday and, immediately after the rite, opened the Shishinden and its garden up to the citizens of Kyoto. But the key technique deployed to engage people with the new emperor was a Fukuba, who deserves to be better known, was temporal one: the government switched the era a nativist scholar from Tsuwano 津和野 domain. name. The enthronement of the new emperor Tsuwano shared its western border with marked the moment at which the Meiji period Chōshū 長州 domain in the west of the main formally began. Time, for all Japanese, now island of Honshū. The two domains worked became imperial time. It was to be recalibrated closely together on the eve of the Restoration. at accessions, and measured by the span of Chōshū leaders like Kido Takayoshi木戸孝允 emperors’ . This was entirely new.19 (1833-1877) were among the most influential in the new government, and it was Kido who Meiji’s enthronement was new in conception, brought Fukuba on board to run the then, newly scripted and newly staged. The government’s office for ritual and religious decisive difference from premodern models was affairs. Fukuba was responsible for the - precisely that the emperor used it to construct Buddhist separation edicts published earlier in privileged relations of power with the Sun the year, and for shrine policy more generally.20 Goddess and his ancestors, with the modern He helped shape the new government’s policy

9 18 | 12 | 1 APJ | JF on , and even now he was fashioning a modern ritual program for the imperial court.21 This same Fukuba Bisei assumed charge of modern Japan’s first daijōsai. He ensured that, like the enthronement that preceded it, the daijōsai was suitably staged to meet the needs of a modern emperor in an international age.

ii. The Meiji Daijōsai

22 Immediately after his enthronement in autumn Figure 15: Daijō Palace, Tokyo, 1871 1868, the emperor and his government uprooted from Kyoto and relocated east to Tokyo, which duly became Japan’s new imperial The emperor, visible in robes of pure white, has capital. The first daijōsai of the modern era just left the Kairyūden Hall 廻立殿, where he took place in the grounds of Tokyo Castle on purified himself (right of picture). He now the night of 28 December 1871, three full years makes his stately way toward the Yukiden Hall after the enthronement. The Meiji government 悠紀殿 (center left) where he will feast with the had abolished the feudal domains, restructured Sun Goddess on rice, millet and wine. Before the administration under a revamped Great dawn, he will eat with her once more, in the Council of State (Dajōkan 太政官), over which adjacent Sukiden Hall 主基殿. What the image the new emperor now presided, at least in conceals is the presence of senior political theory. In brief, Japan had by the end of 1871 leaders: Prime Minister Sanjō Sanetomi 三条実 laid the foundations for a modern centralized 美 (1837-1891), who has proceeded ahead of state under a new, emperor-centered the emperor; and Saigō Takamori西郷隆盛 government. The emperor’s performance of the (1828-1877), Etō Shinpei江藤新平 ( daijōsai in the new capital gave to the rite an 1834-1874), Terajima Munenori寺島宗則 unprecedented political quality; to the city (1832-1893), Ōkuma Shigenobu大隈重信 itself it lent the character of sacred center. (1838-1922) and a bevy of other senior Figure 15 is an image from a later generation, counsellors and ministry chiefs, who followed but it accurately recreates a key moment from 23 him. The emperor enters the Yukiden Hall; the the event. prime minister and other government leaders remain outside. They wait in silence while the

emperor feasts with his great ancestress, the Sun Goddess.

Fukuba Bisei politicized the daijōsai, then, just as he had the enthronement of three years earlier. He also made it accessible to the Japanese people as never before. In early December, the Meiji government issued to the realm a public notice (Daijōe kokuyu告諭 ), probably penned by Fukuba, explaining the daijōsai; it declared a national holiday, too; and

10 18 | 12 | 1 APJ | JF it then opened up the Daijō Palace for public government relocated to Kyoto for the viewing after the event. The public notice, duration, along with the diplomatic distributed across the realm, situated the community. Kyoto became – albeit daijōsai as a celebration of the Sun Goddess, fleetingly – the political center of modern and of her legitimation of imperial rule. It made Japan. the point that the emperor receives his right to ii. The enthronement was coupled directly rule from her, and not from the military men now, for the first time, to the autumnal who had overthrown the Tokugawa, nor of daijōsai (Accession Ordinance, Article 4). course from the common people. The notice Emperor Taisho’s enthronement and concluded by declaring three days of national daijōsai were both held in Kyoto within holiday, “in order that people might head to the space of four days in . their local shrines to thank the Sun Goddess for Yoshihito had received the regalia 24 her blessings.” In the new capital of Tokyo at immediately upon the death of his father least, there is evidence of widespread merry- back in . making. iii. Now for the first time, there was to be a key ritual role for the empress.

(Accession Ordinance, Article 11). Empress Teimei 貞明皇后 was in the end iii Taisho Evolution absent from the accession owing to her Meiji the Great, as the emperor came to be pregnancy, but the idea that emperor known, died in 1912. He had presided over the and empress should both participate in dramatic transformation of Japan from a the accession rites was now established. decentralized, feudal state into a modern with a constitutional . He was succeeded by his son, Yoshihito嘉仁 In Taisho, no single figure influenced the (r.1912-1926), the man known to history as enthronement in the way that Fukuba Bisei had Emperor Taisho. Yoshihito was the first to done in early Meiji. Rather, the Accession ascend the throne under the terms of the Meiji Ordinance provided for a Board of Accession Constitution of 1889. And as we shall see, his Experts, known as Taireishi 大礼使 (Articles 5, accession rites in 1915 evolved to 7, 10 and 12). It was headed by Prince Fushimi accommodate the fact he was a constitutional 伏見宮貞愛親王 (1858-1923); its de facto . Taisho’s enthronement was further 細川潤次郎 fashioned by two new bodies of law:the leaders were Hosokawa Junjirō 伊東巳代治 Imperial Household Law (Kōshitsu tenpan) of (1834-1923) and Itō Miyoji 1889 and the Accession Ordinance (Tōkyokurei (1857-1934). The board was responsible to the 登極令) of 1909. Of their many stipulations, prime minister, and bureaucrats from every three had immediate implications for the ministry in the government –Foreign and staging of the accession drama: Home, Finance, Transport, Army and Navy - were seconded to it. There was an unprecedented mobilization of state power behind the Taisho accession. i. The enthronement and the daijōsai would take place not in the modern capital city Japan in the 1910s was after all a modern of Tokyo but in the ancient imperial nation-state with a thriving economy, a center of Kyoto (Imperial Household powerful military, and an external empire Law, Chapter 2). As a result, emperor, incorporating , Taiwan and Sakhalin. prime minister and the entire Japanese Japan was a major player on the international

11 18 | 12 | 1 APJ | JF stage, bound to Great Britain in the Anglo- journey from Tokyo to Kyoto; and this was her Japanese Alliance, and was presently at war temporary abode. What is striking about the with . Domestically, though, rapid Shunkōden is that it was designed as a public industrialization had led to profound social space. It was built to accommodate 1,000 ritual upheaval. Socialism was taking root, and the participants. So, on the morning of 10 movement known as Taisho was November 1915, when the new emperor duly gathering momentum. All of this impacted on entered the Shunkōden to worship the Sun the rites of accession and, indeed, on the new Goddess, he did so in the presence of Prime emperor’s reign. In what follows, I amMinister Ōkuma Shigenobu, his cabinet, concerned with the strategies deployed by the prefectural governors and many other government to develop those three definitive dignitaries, including ambassadors and their relationships of power: with the Sun Goddess wives from eighteen nations. And as the and the imperial ancestors, with the state and emperor worshipped here, so were his with the Japanese people. emissaries making offerings on his behalf at the Ise Shrines, and at ancestral mausolea in Nara and Kyoto, and at major state shrines across the land.

Figure 16: Enthronement Hall, Kyoto 191525

The Shishinden Enthronement Hall and garden Figure 17: Shunkōden (Spring Hall) of the Kyoto Palace, decked out for the November, 191526 performance of 10 November 1915, can be seen in Figure 16. The hall is essentially the same as it was fifty years before at the time of Meiji’s enthronement. It has, though, been The emperor encountered the Sun Goddess thoroughly refurbished, and has acquired a again, of course, in the daijōsai just four days magnificent new porch for the emperor’s later on 14 November. She featured once more motorcars. What is entirely new is the structure on 20 November, in an entirely new accession adjacent to it on its eastern side. This is the act (Act 4), which saw the emperor leave Kyoto Shunkōden 春興殿 or Spring Hall (Figure 17). It on an historic pilgrimage to Ise. There he faced stands where the old Naishidokoro used to be, the Sun Goddess, and worshipped her (Figure and like the Naishidokoro, it is a ritual space 18). He returned to Kyoto the next day, before for imperial acts of worship. The Sun Goddess setting off to Emperor Jinmu’s mausoleum in had accompanied Emperor Taisho on his train Nara, and then the mausoleums of Emperor

12 18 | 12 | 1 APJ | JF

Meiji, and his father, grandfather and great grandfather. At each site, he performed acts of filial veneration, which were styled shin’etsu 親 謁 or “intimate audiences.” Emperors’ post- enthronement pilgrimages are one of several Taisho period innovations.

Figure 19: PM Ōkuma in the Shishinden, 10 November 191528

This too was a moment without precedent. And then Prime Minister Ōkuma featured at the daijōsai, as indeed he had done more than four decades before in 1871. The prime minister and his cabinet, accompanied by hundreds of Figure 18: Emperor Taisho Crosses the Uji Japanese and foreign dignitaries, later attended Bridge in the Inner Shrine Precinct, Ise, a succession of state banquets in Nijō Castle 二 December 191527 条城 personally hosted by the emperor. But the most striking aspect of Emperor Taisho’s engagement with state power concerned the deployment of the armed forces in a new and The Taisho enthronement bound the new final fifth accession act. After all, the emperor emperor to state power in innovative ways, too. was commander-in-chief of the army and navy The elderly prime minister, Ōkuma Shigenobu, under Article 11 of the . was scripted a leading role here. Ōkuma is just about visible in Figure 19, clad in ancient court After completing his ancestral pilgrimage at attire, standing before the steps leading up to the end of November, the new emperor the Shishinden Hall. He recites returneda to Tokyo. On 2 December, he congratulatory address, and then leads the progressed from the palace to the Aoyama assembled audience of some 3000 Japanese Parade Ground 青山練兵場 where he presided and foreign dignitaries in three shouts of over the largest military review ever held in banzai, or “Long Live the Emperor!” Japan (Figure 20).

13 18 | 12 | 1 APJ | JF

Figure 20: Imperial Review of Troops, December 191529

The review, styled “Tairei kanpeishiki” 大礼観 兵式, comprised 40,000 troops, 5,000 horses and 200 field guns. 150,000 spectators turned Figure 21: Imperial Review of the Fleet, up to watch, as the emperor - accompanied by December 191530 imperial princes and foreign military attachés - inspected the serried ranks of soldiers, before receiving their salute. The highpoint was a fly- The Taisho enthronement of 1915 was notable, past by aircraft of the new army air corps. The too, as the first in which the emperor engaged very next day, the emperor progressed to fully with the common man, woman and child. , where he boarded the warship The press was proactive here. The major Tsukuba 筑波, and oversaw a naval review of newspapers published between them hundreds unprecedented scale (Figure 21). The review, of articles on the accession, edifying readers styled Tairei kankanshiki 大礼観艦式, saw the with the minutest details of ritual sites, ritual deployment of 125 ships of war - cruisers, performance and ritual meaning. The destroyers, minesweepers and submarines - Education Ministry’s role was crucial, too. By weighing in at some 600,000 tons. Emperor 1915, 70% of all children of primary school age Taisho finally transferred to the battleship Fusō were attending school. The ministry assured 扶桑, where he hosted a banquet. The Fusō, that no child in its care remained ignorant of launched just a month before, was a the accession, and it duly published an official dreadnought-class vessel, armed with 12-inch guide for teachers, which it distributed guns and propelled by steam turbines. It throughout the land. A principal purpose of the surpassed anything in the Royal Navy at the Tairei no yōshi 大礼の要旨, as the guide was time. A fly-past by aircraft of the new fleet air styled, was to relate for children’s edification arm brought the naval review, and the entire the story of the emperor’s descent from the accession spectacle, to a dramatic close. Sun Goddess and his love for his subjects.31 and Kyoto City played their part, too. They hosted an Enthronement Exposition from early October to entertain and, of course, to edify citizens and the hundreds of thousands of visitors who descended on the city (Figure 22).32

14 18 | 12 | 1 APJ | JF

people packed into the palace grounds, and along adjacent streets – many of them school children – chimed in with their own banzai (Figure 24).

Figure 22: The Kyoto Enthronement Exhibition, 191533

And ahead of the new emperor’s arrival, they transformed the entire city into a vibrant, Figure 24: Crowds outside the Kenreimon celebratory space (Figure 23). Gate shout Banzai35

Not just in Kyoto but throughout Japan, and overseas in Japan’s colonies too, people young and old gathered in government offices, factories, companies, banks, schools and at shrines to join the banzai chorus. On this day, in many parts of Japan there were also celebratory sports meets, torch-lit processions, fireworks and lectures. All was made possible by the fact that 10 November was declared a national holiday. Other innovative techniques were deployed, too. There was, for example, a Figure 23: The Celebratory Spaces of nation-wide amnesty of convicted criminals, Kyoto34 which meant that in the city of Kyoto, where the enthronement took place, 1000 men and 50 women had their sentences quashed or reduced. The emperor also made a gift of one We saw that Prime Minister Ōkuma Shigenobu million yen for disbursement to men and had stood before the emperor and feted him women of over 80 years old throughout the with three shouts of banzai. This was a moment empire. of especial significance in the emperor’s engagement with his subjects. For, as he led The daijōsai, too, was the focus for popular the assembled guests in the banzai at exactly engagement. We have seen that the Daijō 3.30pm on 10 November, the 150,000 or so Palace complex features two main halls, the

15 18 | 12 | 1 APJ | JF

Yukiden Hall and Sukiden Hall. The two halls Just nine years into his reign, he succumbed to represent the two different regions of Japan in mental illness and withdrew from public life, which the ritual rice and millet are harvested. relinquishing state functions to his son, In 1915, those regions were Kagawa Prefecture 裕仁. The emperor died in 1926, and 香川県, west of Kyoto, and 愛 Hirohito immediately received the regalia.37 知県, east of Kyoto. The Taishō innovation was The era name changed to Showa. Then, in to invite farmers and manufacturers from all 1928, the man known to history as the Showa over Japan, and from the colonies too, to offer Emperor (r.1926-1989) performed both the local produce to the emperor and the Sun enthronement and the daijōsai in Kyoto, just Goddess. So, for example, Kyoto producers like his father before him. Indeed, in every supplied rice, soy beans, sweet-fish, turnips, important regard, the Showa accession rites potatoes, and chestnuts. From Korea, there was followed the precedent of Taisho. dried abalone, cabbages, pears and apples; from Taiwan dried bonito, citrus buntan, and Just a decade into the new emperor’s reign, bananas, and from Sakhalin, dried cod,Japan waged war on ; then came war in seaweed, and potatoes. All this produce was set the Pacific. Defeat and occupation were the out before the Yukiden and Sukiden Halls. As consequences. The US-led occupation quickly we have seen, this technique of engaging the imposed on Japan a new constitution, and the emperor with people through their offerings of new constitution sought to transform the local produce at the daijōsai continues to this quality of Japanese emperorship for a second day. time in less than three generations. The US was intent on using the Showa emperor even as it There was a solemn, somber mood in Kyoto on curbed his powers. The new SCAP-approved the day of thedaijōsai , but thereafter emperor was no longer sacred or inviolable; he celebrations resumed. When the emperor was neither head-of-state, nor commander of hosted “accession banquets” at Nijō Castle on Japan’s armed forces. The constitution defined 16 and 17 November, vast crowds lined the him as something quite new and different. He streets to watch him and the imperial princes, was “symbol of the state and of the unity of the prime minister, cabinet members and assorted people,” deriving his position from the will of dignitaries Japanese and foreign, make their the people “in whom resides sovereign way in horse-drawn carriages to the castle. 16 power.”38 Emperor Akihito was the first to November was in fact a day of banqueting succeed to the throne under this new throughout the Japanese empire. And then, on constitution. His accession rites, held in Tokyo 1 December, the ritual sites, that is the from 1989 through 1990, were duly re-scripted Enthronement Hall and garden, the temporary and re-produced to account for the postwar wooden buildings of the Daijō Palace, and the change. So, what changed and what remained banqueting halls of Nijō Castle were all opened the same? up for public viewing. They remained open for five full months, and are said to have received The emperor’s three critical relationships – over 2.5 million visitors.36 with his ancestors, with the state, and with the people - survived into the postwar accession rites and so into postwar emperorship. The people are no longer subjects of a sovereign 3) The Emperor’s Abdication emperor, of course; the people are now sovereign. But there is a striking ritual For all the genuine rejoicing in autumn 1915, continuity in, say, the orchestration of people’s Emperor Taisho’s reign was short and troubled. engagement with the emperor through the

16 18 | 12 | 1 APJ | JF offerings of local produce in the daijōsai. The and “an awareness of being with the people.” state, for its part, is no longer headed by the These were the qualities demanded of a emperor; it is now symbolized by the emperor. symbolic emperor. And yet there is vital ritual continuity in the presence of the heads of the three branches of government and, in particular, in the role of the prime minister. He is a key player at the regalia transfer, at the enthronement, and at the daijōsai. The sacred, too, has remained integral to the accession rites of the postwar emperors. The newly enthroned emperor’s veneration of the Sun Goddess, of his ancestors and of the myriad kami constitutes the most obvious ritual continuity with prewar accession rites. The allegedly private status of the postwar daijōsai is seriously compromised by state involvement and indeed public participation. In other words, for all the genuine constitutional change in the quality of emperorship, there is much ritual Figure 25: Emperor Akihito delivers his continuity. address to the nation, 8 August 2016

The accession rites of Naruhito in 2019 followed those of his father precisely, except in one vital aspect. They began not with the state Both in his challenge to the Imperial Household funeral of a deceased emperor, but with newly Law and in his reading of the constitution, the construed rites of abdication. The abdication emperor was pitting himself against the was the outcome of Emperor Akihito’s personal administration of Prime Minister Abe Shinzō. intervention in August 2016. Here I want to We know that, in autumn 2015, Emperor reflect briefly on the repercussions of this Akihito had informed the prime minister of his intervention for emperorship. The intervention, wish to abdicate, and proposed raising the as we saw, took the form of an unprecedented matter at his birthday press conference in plea by the emperor for popular understanding. December. The proposal did not meet with The emperor’s TV address was a challenge to prime ministerial approval, however, and the the Imperial Household Law, which denied him emperor’s frustration grew. In July 2016, he the right to abdicate (Figure 25). The emperor sidestepped the prime minister, and directed also offered his audience a new reading of the Imperial Household Agency to inform NHK emperorship, as set out in the Constitution of of his determination to step down. When NHK Japan. In the absence of constitutional clarity, broadcast the scoop to the nation on the night he had struggled with the meaning of “symbolic of 13 July, the PM’s office was caught emperor” in Article 1, but had finally reached completely unawares. Overwhelming popular the conclusion that, “[His] first and foremost support for the emperor forced the prime duty [was] to pray for [the] peace andminister’s hand, and he duly convened a happiness of all the people.” He insisted, with council of experts to debate the options. They still greater conviction, on his need to “stand by were two-fold: either a one-off bill enabling the people, listen to their voices, and be close Akihito to abdicate; or reform of the Imperial to them in their thoughts.” It was his role to Household Law to allow abdication for all nurture “deep understanding of the people,” emperors. The prime minister and the LDP

17 18 | 12 | 1 APJ | JF preferred the former; the emperor was known Nikai Toshihiro 二階俊博, secretary general of to favor the latter. the LDP, opined that in a democratic society like Japan’s, where equality between the sexes If the truth be known, Prime Minister Abe and obtains, the obvious solution is female his government did not support abdication; succession. In an age of “respect for women,” they wanted the emperor to stay put, and hand we can make no exception for the imperial over burdensome tasks to a , as provided family, he insisted in November 2019.40 This for in the Imperial Household Law. They were proves to be a minority view within the LDP, wary, too, of tampering with that law, not least however. There are, of course, two “empress because it would refocus attention on the options,” and it is not clear whether Nikai fraught issue of the imperial line’s future, and advocates both. One involves succession of a the paucity of male heirs. Chapter 1 of the law woman, descended from a male emperor, to the sanctions succession by males only, and there throne for a single generation (josei tennō 女性 are just three eligible males. With regard to 天皇); the other, longer term option involves abdication, the Kōmeitō, the LDP’s partner in the succession of the offspring of an empress government, toed the LDP line, opting for a and her commoner husband (jokei tennō 女系天 one-off law. The opposition parties on the 皇). There is ample historical precedent for the whole favored inserting a new abdication former, but none for the latter. Deputy Prime 麻生太郎 clause into the Imperial Household Law. Minister Asō Tarō spoke for the LDP Minshintō Secretary General Noda Yoshihiko, majority when he declared it “inconceivable” that the throne could ever be occupied by was adamant that now was the time to legalize 41 abdication for all emperors. The Shamintō someone not descended from a male emperor. The LDP solution is to “reactivate” the concurred on the grounds that emperors’ collateral families abolished during the human were at stake. This position was occupation.42 Five young members of these shared by the Seikatsu no tō and the families are presently alive, it is true, but to Communist party.39 But on this matter, the date not one has expressed a desire to return to government had its way. On 16 June 2017, it the imperial fold.43 passed a special bill allowing abdication for Akihito alone. There is also the related issue of “female collateral families.”44 At present, a princess In the end, abdication could not be uncoupled must leave the imperial family when she from the broader issue of succession. Indeed, marries a commoner (Imperial Household Law, the law carried a supplementary resolution Chapter 2 Article 12). One proposal much 付帯決議 (futai ketsugi ) promising a full debate discussed in the media, and debated by on the future of the imperial line, as soon as the opposition parties, is to allow princesses rites of accession were complete. At the time of married to commoners to remain within the writing, a year after the transfer of regalia, and fold as heads of new female collateral families. six months after thedaijōsai , the promised There are two implications to the proposal: 1) it debate has yet to take place. However, in the would mean no further reduction in the number wake of the daijōsai, the media pressured the of princesses available to perform public government and the opposition parties to duties, and would therefore lighten the burden declare their respective positions on how best all round; 2) male offspring of the princess’s to secure the imperial line’s future. A brief marriage to a commoner would be eligible to survey of those positions will suffice to show succeed, thus increasing the pool of heirs to the that the quality of Japanese emperorship throne. The Abe administration is opposed to remains contested. the female collateral family initiative precisely

18 18 | 12 | 1 APJ | JF because it opens the door to succession by the theoretically at least commanders-in-chief of offspring of an empress and a commoner. the modern Japanese military. They were also Where do the opposition parties stand? the most persistent and persuasive purveyors of the story of their descent from the Sun Kōmeitō, Kokumin minshutō and Nihon Ishin no Goddess, and of the sacred unbroken imperial Kai are all well-disposed to the succession of line. women to the throne, but only if the woman is the daughter of an emperor. A majority in each This sacred quality of emperorship was first party opposes the idea of the offspring of an articulated in the accession rites of Emperor empress succeeding.45 The Rikken minshutō Meiji in 1868 and 1871. It received legal presents a 90% majority in support of women underpinning in the Meiji Constitution of 1889, succeeding, but that majority drops to (a still and was refined by the Imperial Household Law substantial) 68% when it comes to allowing of 1889 and then the Accession Ordinance of offspring of an empress and a commoner to 1909. It found legitimation above all in the succeed. The Communist party and theaccession rites of the Taisho emperor in 1915 Shamintō have no problem with either of the and the Showa emperor in 1928, and it “empress options,” so long as public opinion is flourished until 1945. And then, for a second with them.46 Public opinion is certainly on their time in much less than a century, there was side. Recent polls suggest that over 70% of the another radical reconfiguration of emperorship. public support both empress options. Active The 1946 Constitution determined that support for the creation of “female collateral Japanese emperors were no more the nation’s families” is to be found in the Rikken minshutō, pivots, or heads of state, or commanders-in- the Shaminto and the Communist Party. chief; they now engaged with the state as its Kokumin minshutō and the Ishin no Kai symbol; and with the people as symbol of their meanwhile are both happy to participate in unity, whatever that meant in practice. But the debates on this matter.47 story of emperors’ descent from the Sun Goddess, and of the unbroken line endured, not least in the emperor’s ritual performances. Postwar emperors have continued to bear ritual Conclusion witness to this sacred quality of emperorship.

The Japanese imperial line is the oldest, The Reiwa accession intimated that continuous hereditary monarchy in the world. emperorship is shifting again. Japanese The secret of its longevity is that it has adapted emperors can now abdicate. The 2017 – it has had to adapt - to the many and varied abdication bill was a one-off, it is true, but legal demands of state and society. Over theprecedent has been set. The problems of centuries, the imperial line has been buffeted imperial succession suggest that further radical by frequent change. No change was greater change is in the offing. There are at present than that forced upon it in the nineteenth three men in line to succeed. In order they are: century Meiji Restoration. After the restoration, 1) Emperor Naruhito’s 54-year old brother, Japanese emperors became the “pivot” of Prince Akishino; 2) the crown prince’s modern Japanese nation-state, “pivot” being a 14-year old son, Prince Hisahito; and 3) Prince word much favored by Meiji periodHitachi 常陸宮, the 83-year old brother of bureaucrats. Modern emperors wereEmperor Emeritus Akihito. For reasons of age, to their subjects. They were men of Hisahito is the most likely of the three to politics, expected to advise, encourage and succeed. Whether or not he will produce a male warn politicians of the day. They wereheir is unknowable, but there is surely a

19 18 | 12 | 1 APJ | JF significant chance that an empress will have to 位新式抄. In Itō Hirobumi 伊藤博文 ed. Hisho ascend the throne in a generation or two. The ruisan (25) 秘書類纂（第25巻）. Hisho Ruisan Japanese people are overwhelmingly supportive Kankōkai, 1936. of the idea. Were it come to pass, it would constitute another decisive shift in the quality Kyōto Fu 京都府. Taishō tairei Kyōtofu kiji: of 21st century Japanese emperorship. The Shomu no bu ge 大正大礼京都府記事 庶務の部 corona virus has put on hold for now the 下. Kyōto Fu, 1917. promised debates, but this author, for one, Monbushō ed. 文部省編. Tairei no yōshi. 大礼 waits with bated breath for their の要旨. Monbushō, 1915. commencement. Miyachi Masato 宮地正人. “Tennōsei ideorogī ni okeru daijōsai no kinō: Jōkyō no saikō yori konnichi made” 天皇制イデオロギーにおける大 嘗祭の機能：貞享の再興より今日まで. Rekishi hyōron 歴史評論４ (1991), pp. 13-38. References Ruoff, Kenneth J. Japan’s Imperial House in the Breen, John. “Ideologues, bureaucrats and Postwar Era, 1945–2019. Harvard East Asian priests: on and Shintō in early Meiji Monographs, 2020. Japan.” In Shintō in history: ways of the kami (co-edited with Mark Teeuwen). HawaiiSakura Tachibana Kyōkai ed.桜橘協会編. University Press, 2000, pp.230-251. Sokui tairei kinenchō 即位大礼記念帳. Sakura Tachibana Kyōkai, 1915. Breen, John and Mark Teeuwen. A new history of Shinto. Wiley-Blackwell, 2010. Sekine Masanao. 関根正直 Sokui rei daijōsai taiten kōwa. 即位礼大嘗祭大典講話. Tōkyō Breen, John. “Abdication, Succession and Hōbunkan, 1915. Japan’s Imperial Future: An Emperor’s Dilemma.” Japan Focus, 17:9, 3 (2019). Shii Kazuo 志位和夫. Tennō no seido to Nihon kyōsantō no tachiba 天皇の制度と日本共産党の Ichida Ofusetto Insatsu Gōshi Kaisha Tōkyō 立場. Nihon Kyōsantō Chūō Iinkai Shiten ed. 市田オフセツト印刷合資会社東京支店 Shuppankyoku, 2019. 編. Go tairei kinen shashinchō 御大礼記念写真 帖. Nihon Denpō Tsūshinsha, 1915. Tairei Kiroku Hensan Iinkai ed. 大礼記録編纂委 員会. Tairei Kiroku 大礼記録. Shimizu Shoten, Itō Yukio 伊藤之雄. Kyōto no kindaika to tennō: 1919. gosho o meguru dentō to kakushin no toshi kūkan 1868-1952 京都の近代化と天皇：御所を Takagi Hiroshi 高木博志. “Sokuishiki (rei), 巡る伝統と革新の都市空間. Chikura Shobō, Daijōsai” 即位式（礼）・大嘗祭. In Hara 2010. Takeshi 原武史 and Yoshida Yutaka 吉田裕 eds. Iwanami Tennō kōshitsu jiten 岩波天皇皇室辞典. Kunaishō Rinji Teishitsu Henshūkyoku 宮内省臨 Iwanami Shoten, 2005. 時帝室編修局 ed. Meiji tenno ki 明治天皇紀 1. Yoshikawa Kōbunkan, 2000. Tokoro Isao 所功. Kindai tairei kankei no kihon shiryō shūsei. 近代大礼関係の基本史料集成. Fukuba Bisei 福羽美静. “Sokui shinshiki shō” 即 Kokusho Kankōkai, 2018.

20 18 | 12 | 1 APJ | JF

John Breen is a professor at the International Research Center for in Kyoto, where he edits the journal Japan Review. He taught Japanese and Japanese history at SOAS (University of ) before joining Nichibunken in 2009.

Among his recent publications are the following books in English: A Social History of the Ise Shrines: Divine Capital (with Mark Teeuwen) Bloomsbury, 2017, and A New History of Shinto (with Mark Teeuwen) Wiley-Blackwell, 2011. He is also the author of two books in Japanese, Shinto monogatari: Ise jingū no kingendaishi, Yoshikawa Kōbunkan, 2015 and Girei to kenryoku: Tennō no Meiji ishin, Heibonsha, 2011.

Among recent articles in English are “Ornamental Diplomacy: Emperor Meiji and the Monarchs of the Modern World.” In Robert Hellyer and Harald Fuess eds. The Meiji Restoration: Japan as a Global Nation. Cambridge University Press, 2020, and “Abdication, Succession and Japan’s Imperial Future: An Emperor’s Dilemma.” The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus, 17:9, 3 (2019).

Notes

1 I have presented versions of this paper at four venues: Dōshisha University in Kyoto, Monash University in , International Christian University in Tokyo, and Tōhoku University in Sendai. I would like thank the organizers, Professors Michael Wachutka, Alison Tokita, Mark Williams and Orion Klautau respectively, for inviting me to address them, their colleagues and students. 2 The address can be replayed on the Kunaichō 宮内庁 website, where the Japanese and English transcriptions can also be found. 3 The Japanese text and English translation of the emperor’s address on this occasion can be accessed on the Kunaichō website. 4 On the Nippon Kaigi response, see Breen 2019. 5 For examples, see Ruoff 2020, pp. 335-339. Ruoff 2020 is a must-read on the post war imperial institution. 6 This entirely new rite was officially styled “Taii no rei seiden no gi” 退位の礼正殿の儀. 7 This is a two-scene act. Scene 1 was styled “Kenjitō shōkei no gi” 剣璽等承継の儀, and Scene 2 “Sokuigo chōken no gi” 即位後朝見の儀. 8 This act is known officially as “Sokuirei seiden no gi” 即位礼正殿の儀. 9 Rice and millet used in the Yukiden were harvested in 栃木県; Kyoto 京都 府 provided rice and millet for the Sukiden. 10 The budget in question is referred to as kyūteihi 宮廷費 in Japanese. It covers “necessary expenditure for the public activities of the imperial house.” There is a second budget, the naiteihi 内廷費, set aside for the private use of the imperial family. 11 See the full text.

21 18 | 12 | 1 APJ | JF

12 The 2019 amnesty was limited in scope to 550,000 men and women who had been convicted of minor crimes, fined, and paid their fines more than three years previously. Most were guilty of road traffic offenses, it seems. The 1990 amnesty on the occasion of Akihito’s enthronement benefited 2.5 million people with criminal records. 13 The produce is referred to as niwazumi no tsukue shiromono 庭積の机代物, which translates inelegantly as “items [for display] on tables in the [Daijōkyū] garden.” 14 Produce from regions in the west of Japan, marked in blue, were placed before the Sukiden Hall; the produce in purple from the east of Japan was placed before the Yukiden Hall. 15 Photos by author. 16 See, for example, the article on the BBC website, styled “Naruhito: Japan’s emperor proclaims enthronement in ancient ceremony.” 17 “Meiji tennō gosokuishiki no zu” 明治天皇御即位式之図 (Source: Sekine Masanao. 関根正直 Sokui rei daijōsai kōwa. 即位礼大嘗祭大典講話. Tōkyō Hōbunkan, 1915.) 18 For the details of the Meiji enthronement rite, I draw on Kunaishō Rinji Teishitsu Henshūkyoku 宮内省臨時帝室編修局 vol. 1. On the enthronement, see also Takagi 2005. 19 A change of era name for a new reign was not unheard of in the past, but only in the case of the 延暦period (782-806) did the same era name endure throughout the reign of the emperor. There were multiple reasons for changing era names; the vast majority had nothing to do with the emperor. 20 The so-called Shinto-Buddhist separation - or more correctly “clarification” – edicts stripped all vestiges of Buddhism away from shrines, creating in the process entirely new “Shinto” and “Buddhist” spaces. In its rejection of all things Buddhist, the Meiji enthronement was very much an outcome of these historic edicts. On the edicts, see Breen 2000, pp.230-251. 21 On Fukuba and his role in the Restoration government, see in English Breen 2000, Chapter 12. Fukuba articulated his ambitions for the enthronement in his Sokuishinshiki shō, dated September 1868, just before the event took place. 22 Daijōsai 大嘗祭 by Nisei Goseda Hōryū 二世五姓田芳柳 (Source: Kunaichō Kunai Kōbunshokan Shozō 宮内庁宮内公文書館所蔵) 23 Iwakura Tomomi, Kido Takayoshi, Itō Hirobumi and many other senior leaders were not in attendance. They had left Japan a week earlier on 23 December for an extended tour of the US and as members of the so-called . 24 The Daijōe kokuyu is reproduced in Tokoro 2018. On the Meiji daijōsai, see especially Miyachi 1991, Takeda 1996 (Chapters 8 and 9) and Breen and Teeuwen 2010 (Chapter 5). 25 “Shishinden” (Source: Ichida Ofusetto Insatsu Gōshi Kaisha Tōkyō Shiten 1915.) 26 “Shunkōden (Source: Ichida Ofusetto Insatsu Gōshi Kaisha Tōkyō Shiten, 1915.) 27 “Ise daibyō shin’etsu robo Ujibashi tsūgyo” 伊勢大廟親謁鹵簿宇治橋通御 (Source: Tairei Kiroku Hensan Iinkai 1919.) 28 Postcard; author’s collection 29 Source: Tairei Kanpeishiki shashinchō『大礼観兵式写真帖』1915 30 “Gunkan Kawachi kanjō yori mitaru goshōkan Tsukuba kan” 軍艦河内艦上より見たる御召艦 筑波艦 (Source: Sakura Tachibana Kyōkai 1916.) 31 Tairei no yōshi. Monbushō, . 32 The exposition, known as the Taiten Kinen Kyōto Hakurankai 大典記念京都博覧会, was staged in Okazaki Park, east of the Kamo River, and ran for eighty days from 1 October to 19

22 18 | 12 | 1 APJ | JF

December. 33 Taiten Kinen Kyōto Hakurankai (Source: Sakura Tachibana Kyōkai 1916.) 34 “Seiga o mukaematsuru Kyōto” 聖駕を迎えまつる京都 (Source: Ichida Ofusetto Insatsu Gōshi Kaisha Tōkyō Shiten 1915) 35 Source: Ichida Ofusetto Insatsu Gōshi Kaisha Tōkyō Shiten 1915. 36 Itō 2010 pp.109-111. 37 The Imperial Household Law did not allow abdication, so Emperor Taishō remained on the throne till his death. 38 The latest, and most insightful, study of the postwar transformation of the Japanese monarchy is Ruoff 2020. 39 For party responses both to the emperor’s message and to the issue of abdication, see, for example, the 9 August 2016 editions of the Asahi shinbun, the Mainichi shinbun and the Yomiuri shinbun. The Communist Party reconciled itself to the existence of the “emperor system” at its Annual Conference in 2004. For the arguments, see Shii 2019. 40 Mainichi shinbun 27 November 2019. 41 Mainichi shinbun 10 December 2019. An Asahi shinbun poll conducted in July 2019 found that only 7% of LDP members supported jokei tennō, while three times as many, 23%, supported josei tennō. Asahi shinbun 23 July 2019. 42 Mainichi shinbun 20 November 2019, 10 December 2019. 43 Ruoff 2020, pp. 342-343. 44 On this, see Ruoff 2020, pp. 343-347. 45 Asahi shinbun 23 July 2019; Asahi shinbun 18 August 2019. 46 Asahi shinbun 18 July 2019. 47 Asahi shinbun 17 May 2019; Asahi shinbun 12 June 2019.

23